By: Nidhi Goya

{ https://www.industrytap.com/ }

05-10-2021 om 00:30 geschreven door peter  

By: Bianca 

Image by ThePixelman from Pixabay

Rolls-Royce has proudly announced that its all-electric airplane, named the ‘Spirit of Innovation’, has completed its maiden voyage with success, proving its worthiness. The plane flew for approximately 15 minutes, taking off from and landing at the Boscombe Down site in the UK. This first flight is an amazing achievement that has been planned for over a year now and which follows six months of taxying trials.

The ‘Spirit of Innovation’ features the most power-dense battery pack ever built for an aircraft, so this is a record holder of many figures. Here are the most important ones:

• It can reach speeds of 300 MPH (483 KPH), which is a record for an electric plane.
• It features 6,000 cells that constitute its battery pack, delivering 750 Volts.
• The three-motor powertrain delivers 750 kW (1006 hp) of power.

This is an extremely powerful machine, but don’t think that its battery juice is depleted in just 15 minutes, as this was only a tentative demonstration. Rolls-Royce says the range should reach about 200 miles (322 km), but obviously, one would have to travel at lower, cruising speeds to achieve that. On a single charge, and by not being pushed too hard, it should be able to fly from London to Paris.

Rolls-Royce Spirit of Innovation electric aircraft

The marvel of engineering that is the ‘Spirit of Innovation’ extends to all its systems and subcomponents. For example, the energy efficiency of the electric powertrain is 90%, reaching unprecedented levels. The battery cells contain a cooling system that regulates its performance automatically, ensuring that the pack remains safe and stable.

Rolls-Royce believes in this projectsso much that they are planning to actually deliver a “toned-down” all-electric passenger aircraft based on the ‘Spirit of Innovation’ to Widerøe, the largest regional airline in Scandinavia, as soon as by 2026.

RELATED VIDEOS, selected and posted by peter2011

{ https://www.industrytap.com/ }

05-10-2021 om 00:25 geschreven door peter  

{ https://www.hln.be/ }

25-09-2021 om 21:45 geschreven door peter  

Mammoth Hybrid To Be Made Using Asian Elephants

An American company has announced its plans to create a woolly mammoth hybrid using Asian elephant DNA. Based on the now extinct woolly mammoth, the company’s team of genetic scientists claim their new creature will help in the fight against climate change.

Before we begin, unlike almost every other reporter on the planet I will offer you a dose of respect by refraining from childish terms such as “genetic horror show.” Neither will I refer to Jurassic Park or any other fantasy movies while telling this story.

Colossal, a US bio-tech company based in Austin, Texas, recently announced their plans to genetically edit DNA from Asian elephants. They aim to create a new mammoth hybrid or a mammoth-elephant hybrid that will resemble the ancient woolly mammoth. The purpose of creating these new mammoth hybrids is not, however, to fill a host of next-generation zoos but to “help fight climate change,” according to the researchers

The woolly mammoth hybrid will be “built” by editing Asian elephant DNA.

( petrroudny / Adobe Stock)

The Mammoth Hybrid: Made By Editing Elephant DNA

Professor George Church is a biologist who leads Synthetic Biology at Harvard Medical School’s Wyss Institute, where he oversees “the directed evolution of molecules, polymers, and whole genomes to create new tools.” It was Church who first conceived the idea to rebuild, not to bring back, the woolly mammoth .

Church developed ways to read and then edit elephant DNA , and he now plans to create a new version of the woolly mammoth that went extinct over 10,000 years ago.

• Russia Wants to Clone Ancient Scythian Warriors
• First Humans in New England May Have Met and Hunted Woolly Mammoths

Professor Ben Lamm, the tech entrepreneur who cofounded Colossal with Church, told CNN that the private company intends to produce the first hybridized-elephant calves “in the next four to six years.”

Such a controversial project didn’t take long to build significant heat among biotech investors . Colossal has been backed by a consortium of private enterprises. Among the investors are the American Winklevoss twins, who might or might not have created Facebook. CNN reported that Colossal has “raised $15 million to pursue their goal.”

An Asian elephant in Yala National Park, Sri Lanka. This elephant species will be used in a genetic reverse engineering process that will ultimately result in a wooly mammoth hybrid.

( mariusltu / Adobe Stock)

Reverse Engineering Modern Elephant DNA To Make A Mammoth

Until now, most genetic researchers have tried to “recreate” mammoths from ancient DNA. Colossal and visionary Church plan to reverse engineer DNA from modern Asian elephants to create a new hybrid creature that will resemble the ancient mammoth.

Now you can clearly see that almost every headline out there is click bait. Colossal isn’t actually cloning an ancient mammoth’s DNA. This project is about editing the genetic code of modern Asian elephants, which share a common ancestor with the woolly mammoth.

The team at Colossal will be creating “a new” elephant-mammoth hybrid and the job of reverse engineering the elephant’s DNA is expected to take about “50 changes,” said Church. According to The Guardian , Church said the animal will be custom designed to survive and thrive in the Arctic , so that it “will enjoy its time at -40C, and do all the things that elephants do, and mammoths did.”

The idea or goal behind the woolly mammoth hybrid is to help the environment because large herds of mammoths once broke up moss and knocked down trees. These new creatures may help to slow erosion and lower CO2 levels, says Colossal’s top scientist.

( Anton / Adobe Stock)

DNA Manipulation To Help a Planet In Climate Change

Church believes that reviving a version of the woolly mammoth might “ help the environment .” He explained to CNN that before 10,000 years ago huge herds of mammoths once helped the proliferation of grasslands, ”because they broke up moss and knocked down trees.” Church believes that places like Siberia might be turned into grassland again, which the genetic scientist thinks might help the environment by “stopping erosion and controlling carbon dioxide.”

To stand these extremes conditions the animals will require "fat, shaggy hair, and small ears,” but their ancient ivory tusks will be omitted to save them being stalked by illegal poachers. Church told the New York Times “everything up to this point has been relatively easy. Every tissue we’ve gone after, we’ve been able to get a recipe for.” Convinced he has figured out how to map the DNA of elephants, the next step, according to Church, is the difficult bit.

The process of making a woolly mammoth hybrid or, better said, a mammoth-elephant hybrid.

( VectorMine / Adobe Stock)

The Edited DNA Embryo Will Grow in an Artificial Womb

The edited DNA must be brought to life in an embryo of some sort, which will develop into a living animal. The reason this is complicated is because no one has ever successfully harvested an egg from an elephant or attempted to perform in vitro fertilization on the creature.

Church detailed his plans to build an “artificial womb” that will be large enough to hold a two-hundred-pound (91-kilogram) elephant fetus for two years. While womb trials successfully grew a lamb fetus in four weeks, Colossal’s artificial elephant’s womb will require much more complexity that that of a sheep.

• Amazing New Siberian Mammoth Remains May Lead to Cloning Breakthrough
• Is This Proof Early Man Weaponized Ivory from Woolly Mammoth Tusks to Kill...Woolly Mammoths?

There we have it folks! Now you know the wooly mammoth is “not” being brought back. Meanwhile, all the headlines in the mainstream media outlets are using the word “revival” and the term “brought back,” with Jurassic Park styling and childish fear mongering.

• Top image: The idea of the woolly mammoth hybrid is based not on ancient DNA cloning but on reverse engineering living Asian elephant DNA and then growing the embryo in an artificial womb. No one knows for sure what the mammoth hybrid will look like, but many of the features of this ancient extinct species will be recreated no doubt. Source: dottedyeti / Adobe Stock

By Ashley Cowie

{ https://www.ancient-origins.net/ )

22-09-2021 om 01:33 geschreven door peter  

A new de-extinction company called Colossal that is being led by entrepreneur Ben Lamm and geneticist Dr. George Church say that they are hoping to resurrect the extinct woolly mammoth within the next six years. While the last of the woolly mammoths went extinct about 4,000 years ago, the new plan is to change the genome of Asian elephants in order to create modern mammoths.

In a press release, Lamm discussed their intentions, “Never before has humanity been able to harness the power of this technology to rebuild ecosystems, heal our Earth and preserve its future through the repopulation of extinct animals,” adding, “In addition to bringing back ancient extinct species like the woolly mammoth, we will be able to leverage our technologies to help preserve critically endangered species that are on the verge of extinction and restore animals where humankind had a hand in their demise.”

So, how exactly do they plan on resurrecting the mammoth? They would have to add mammoth genes to DNA from Asian elephants in order to create curved tusks, tinier ears, subcutaneous fat stores, and a thick shaggy coat that would allow them to live in the Arctic Circle. This combination would create an Asian elephant/woolly mammoth hybrid.

Asian elephants

There are several issues regarding the resurrection of an already extinct animal as noted by Dr. Victoria Herridge who is a researcher at the National History Museum, “There are a lot of questions raised by this project. The key ethical points are the aspects of animal experimentation and husbandry – what is this creature? Is it a new species? How many do you need?” “Then if they succeed, what will the needs be of an intelligent social creature? And what are our obligations to it?”

There in fact two different ways animals could be resurrected. The first is cloning where the DNA in the cell of one animal is inserted into a fertilized egg and put into a surrogate mother – there hasn’t been a complete mammoth genome that has been found yet so that poses a problem. The second manner is finding individual genes of one animal and inserting them into the genome of another – this could possibly work for bringing the mammoth back as the modified genome would be put into a fertilized elephant egg and then put into a surrogate elephant. Artificial wombs have been suggested but there’s no proof that those would work either.

“At that point you have to start asking questions about the ethics of experimentation on elephants. You won’t know whether or not there is an issue with your chimeric creature until further down the line,” Dr. Herridge pointed out.

Mural by Charles R. Knight in 1916.

(Via Wikipedia)

As for whether or not resurrecting the woolly mammoth would actually reverse climate change, the company stated that they hope to “re-wild extinct species to their original habitats so they can revitalize lost ecosystems for a healthier planet.” There is a theory that mammoths aided in fighting climate change by bringing back and maintaining the plentiful grassland steppes in the Arctic but after they went extinct, the area turned to forests. Since forests absorb heat from the sun, the grassland would help to cool the planet.

While it would be interesting and a little eerie to see a woolly mammoth roaming around, this new company is focused on bringing even more extinct animals back from the dead – what could possibly go wrong?

ALL RELATED VIDEOS, selected and posted by peter2011

{ https://mysteriousuniverse.org/ }

17-09-2021 om 23:04 geschreven door peter  

GETTY IMAGES

{ https://futurism.com/the-byte }

15-09-2021 om 16:57 geschreven door peter  

By: Nidhi Goyal 

Image courtesy: hyperfine

{ https://www.industrytap.com/ }

04-09-2021 om 22:41 geschreven door peter  

Kameleonrobot kan van kleur veranderen

{ https://www.eoswetenschap.eu/ }

18-08-2021 om 16:31 geschreven door peter  

Are You Ready for Benevolent Artificial Intelligence

Picture yourself driving on a narrow road in the near future when suddenly another car emerges from a bend ahead. It is a self-driving car with no passengers inside. Will you push forth and assert your right of way, or give way to let it pass? At present, most of us behave kindly in such situations involving other humans. Will we show that same kindness towards autonomous vehicles?

Using methods from behavioural game theory, an international team of researchers at LMU Munich and the University of London have conducted large-scale online studies to see whether people would behave as cooperatively with artificial intelligence (AI) systems as they do with fellow humans.

Cooperation holds a society together. It often requires us to compromise with others and to accept the risk that they let us down. Traffic is a good example. We lose a bit of time when we let other people pass in front of us and are outraged when others fail to reciprocate our kindness. Will we do the same with machines?

The study which is published in the journal iScience found that, upon first encounter, people have the same level of trust toward AI as for human: most expect to meet someone who is ready to cooperate.The difference comes afterwards. People are much less ready to reciprocate with AI, and instead exploit its benevolence to their own benefit. Going back to the traffic example, a human driver would give way to another human but not to a self-driving car.The study identifies this unwillingness to compromise with machines as a new challenge to the future of human-AI interactions.

Credit: Pixabay

“We put people in the shoes of someone who interacts with an artificial agent for the first time, as it could happen on the road,” explains Jurgis Karpus, Ph.D., a behavioural game theorist and a philosopher at LMU Munich and the first author of the study. “We modelled different types of social encounters and found a consistent pattern. People expected artificial agents to be as cooperative as fellow humans. However, they did not return their benevolence as much and exploited the AI more than humans.”

With perspectives from game theory, cognitive science, and philosophy, the researchers found that ‘algorithm exploitation’ is a robust phenomenon. They replicated their findings across nine experiments with nearly 2,000 human participants. Each experiment examines different kinds of social interactions and allows the human to decide whether to compromise and cooperate or act selfishly. Expectations of the other players were also measured. In a well-known game, the Prisoner’s Dilemma, people must trust that the other characters will not let them down. They embraced risk with humans and AI alike, but betrayed the trust of the AI much more often, to gain more money.

“Cooperation is sustained by a mutual bet: I trust you will be kind to me, and you trust I will be kind to you. The biggest worry in our field is that people will not trust machines. But we show that they do!” notes Dr. Bahador Bahrami, a social neuroscientist at the LMU, and one of the senior researchers in the study. “They are fine with letting the machine down, though, and that is the big difference. People even do not report much guilt when they do,” he adds.

Biased and unethical AI has made many headline — from the 2020 exams fiasco in the United Kingdom to justice systems — but this new research brings up a novel caution. The industry and legislators strive to ensure that artificial intelligence is benevolent. But benevolence may backfire. If people think that AI is programmed to be benevolent towards them, they will be less tempted to cooperate. Some of the accidents involving self-driving cars may already show real-life examples: drivers recognize an autonomous vehicle on the road, and expect it to give way. The self-driving vehicle meanwhile expects for normal compromises between drivers to hold.“

Algorithm exploitation has further consequences down the line. “If humans are reluctant to let a polite self-driving car join from a side road, should the self-driving car be less polite and more aggressive in order to be useful?” asks Jurgis Karpus.

“Benevolent and trustworthy AI is a buzzword that everyone is excited about. But fixing the AI is not the whole story. If we realize that the robot in front of us will be cooperative no matter what, we will use it to our selfish interest,” says Professor Ophelia Deroy, a philosopher and senior author on the study, who also works with Norway’s Peace Research Institute Oslo on the ethical implications of integrating autonomous robot soldiers along with human soldiers.

“Compromises are the oil that make society work. For each of us, it looks only like a small act of self-interest. For society as a whole, it could have much bigger repercussions. If no one lets autonomous cars join the traffic, they will create their own traffic jams on the side, and not make transport easier”.

Contacts and sources:

• Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München

Publication:

• Algorithm exploitation: humans are keen to exploit benevolent AI.
  Jurgis Karpus, Adrian Krüger, Julia Tovar Verba, Bahador Bahrami, Ophelia Deroy. iScience, 2021; 102679 DOI: 10.1016/j.isci.2021.102679

Source: 

• https://www.ineffableisland.com/2021/06/are-you-ready-for-benevolent-artificial.html

RELATED VIDEOS, selected and posted by peter2011

{ https://beforeitsnews.com/ }

12-08-2021 om 23:59 geschreven door peter  

THIS SQUIRMING ROBOTIC SUPERSTRUCTURE IS THE NEXT ROOMBA

26-07-2021 om 01:51 geschreven door peter  

One of the more intriguing – and highly controversial – claims I’ve heard concerning Area 51 is that top secret research has been undertaken at the base in the field of none other than teleportation. Of course, nothing solid has ever come my way. And, given the fact that the base is impenetrable, it’s unlikely anything ever will. That’s not to say that research isn’t going on in this incredible field, however. Let’s look a bit deeper at the matter of teleportation: the very same technology that has become famous in the likes of Star Trek and the 1958 movie (and its 1986 remake) The Fly. Let’s see what teleportation actually is.  IBM stated the following concerning this decidedly fringe part of science: “Teleportation is the name given by science fiction writers to the feat of making an object or person disintegrate in one place while a perfect replica appears somewhere else. How this is accomplished is usually not explained in detail, but the general idea seems to be that the original object is scanned in such a way as to extract all the information from it, then this information is transmitted to the receiving location and used to construct the replica, not necessarily from the actual material of the original, but perhaps from atoms of the same kinds, arranged in exactly the same pattern as the original.”

IBM continues: “A teleportation machine would be like a fax machine, except that it would work on 3-dimensional objects as well as documents, it would produce an exact copy rather than an approximate facsimile, and it would destroy the original in the process of scanning it. A few science fiction writers consider teleporters that preserve the original, and the plot gets complicated when the original and teleported versions of the same person meet; but the more common kind of teleporter destroys the original, functioning as a super transportation device, not as a perfect replicator of souls and bodies.” In 2017, the Guardian said: “Chinese scientists have teleported an object from Earth to a satellite orbiting 300 miles away in space, in a demonstration that has echoes of science fiction. The feat sets a new record for quantum teleportation, an eerie phenomenon in which the complete properties of one particle are instantaneously transferred to another – in effect teleporting it to a distant location.”

The BBC ran an article on the astounding story titled “Teleportation: Photon particles today, humans tomorrow?” It included the following, under the sub-heading of “What has the Chinese team achieved?”: “They created 4,000 pairs of quantum-entangled photons per second at their laboratory in Tibet and fired one of the photons from each pair in a beam of light towards a satellite called Micius, named after an ancient Chinese philosopher. Micius has a sensitive photon receiver that can detect the quantum states of single photons fired from the ground. Their report – published online – says it is the first such link for ‘faithful and ultra-long-distance quantum teleportation.’ ‘It is a very nice experiment – I would not have expected everything to have worked so fast and so smoothly,’ says Professor Anton Zeilinger from the University of Vienna, who taught Chinese lead scientist Pan Jianwei.”

Star Trek Teleportation

As for the matter of teleportation in the real world, we have to turn our attentions to a man named Eric W. Davis. In 2004, the U.S. Air Force quietly (as in extremely quietly) contracted Davis’ Las Vegas, Nevada-based Warp Drive Metrics company to prepare a report for them on the feasibility of teleportation being feasible. It became known as the Teleportation Physics Study. We know that as the Air Force has now placed the report in the public domain. The specific arm of the Air Force that had a particular interest in teleportation was the Air Force Research Laboratory, Air Force Materiel Command, which is based out of Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, Dayton, Ohio. The Air Force states of the AFRL: “Air Force Research Laboratory, with headquarters at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, Ohio, was created in October 1997. The laboratory was formed through the consolidation of four former Air Force laboratories and the Air Force Office of Scientific Research. The laboratory employs approximately 10,000 military and civilian personnel. It is responsible for managing and annual $4.4 billion (Fiscal Year 2014) science and technology program that includes both Air Force and customer funded research and development. AFRL investment includes basic research, applied research and advanced technology development in air, space and cyber mission areas.

“With headquarters at Wright-Patterson AFB, Ohio, and an additional research facility at Edwards AFB, Calif., the Aerospace Systems Directorate leads the effort to develop and transition superior technology solutions that enable dominant military aerospace vehicles. Areas of focus include vehicle aerodynamics, flight controls, aerospace propulsion, power, rocket propulsion, aerospace structures, and turbine engines. Programs advance a wide variety of aerospace technologies including unmanned vehicles, space access, advanced fuels, hypersonic vehicles, future strike, and energy management.”

What the above tells us is that even if teleportation – as it is popularly perceived – has not been achieved, then, still, a lot of facilities and programs have looked into it. Maybe, one day, we’ll all be surprised and find out that it has been perfected.

RELATED VIDEOS, selected and posted by peter2011

{ https://mysteriousuniverse.org/ }

10-07-2021 om 02:14 geschreven door peter  

“IF WE HAVEN'T REALLY UNDERSTOOD HUMAN EMOTIONS, CAN WE ACTUALLY ... PUT THEM INTO MACHINES?”

WHEN IT COMES TO EXPRESSING EMOTIONS, HUMAN FACES HAVE A LOT TO SAY.

Without speaking a word, we can signal our disgust to those around us with pursed lips and a furrowed brow. Our joy is expressed just as fast: Eyes open wide and lips upturned. Like an overturned flag signaling otherwise unnoticeable distress on a ship at sea, our facial expressions act as a bridge between our internal life and the outside world.

Robots that can expertly express these kinds of emotions will have a better chance at building human relationships and even persuading humans to do what they want, i.e. taking their medicine on time.

But having a robot nail this interaction every time is an incredibly difficult task, says Bilge Mutlu, an associate professor of computer science and psychology and UW Madison. Even humans don’t always get it right.

“When you look at the psychology literature, our understanding of emotions is incomplete,” Mutlu says. “And if we haven't really understood human emotions, can we actually simplify them and put them into machines? That's an open question.”

WHAT IS THE UNCANNY VALLEY?

For humans, these mismatched interactions can be uncomfortable or awkward, but with robots, they can be downright creepy, thanks to the uncanny valley.

The concept was proposed by Japanese roboticist Masahiro Mori in the 1970s to describe a humanoid robot that looks close — but not quite close enough — to a real human.

According to the uncanny valley concept, humans are comfortable interacting with a more abstract and cute robot (think, Pixar’s WALL-E) or an incredibly human-like robot (think, Battlestar Galactica Cylons.) However, there exists a so-called valley between these two robotic extremes where robots look neither truly human nor robotic. This feeling of the “uncanny” might be the shiver you get when walking through a wax museum or when looking at a robotic Einstein video.

Psychologically, scholars have theorized that this discomfort with the not-quite-human may stem from an instinctual fear or distrust of dead human bodies, explains Niedenthal.

To steer clear of the uncanny valley altogether researchers will typically try and keep their robots on the cuter, more abstract side of the curve, says Mutlu. However, when it comes to programming emotions into your bot, he says avoiding creepiness altogether is a little impossible.

HOW DOES IT WORK

The uncanny valley was a challenge that Chen and colleagues were willing to take when designing Eva.

To start, they chose to design Eva as just a disembodied head. While this may instinctually sound creepy, the researchers explain in their April 2021 paper on the project that this design choice was made to help viewers more clearly separate this robot from humans in their minds. For similar reasons, the team also chose to leave Eva’s skull exposed and color its face a distinctly non-human color: blue.

Admittedly, Chen says this decision was influenced partially by the lab's affection for the 2009 movie “Avatar.”

In addition to their 2021 paper published in the journal HardwareX, the team also recently presented a second paper at the 2021 International Conference on Robotics and Automation which further describes Eva’s latest hardware and software developments.

Underneath its blue skin, Eva is equipped with:

• 42 “muscles”
• Expressive, hand-milled eyes
• Base knowledge of six basic human emotions (anger, disgust, fear, joy, sadness, and surprise)

Running an off-the-shelf learning framework on a small Raspberry Pi built into its skull, Eva is able to “look” at human expressions in person or through video and realistically mimic them. This is done by mapping the human face using discrete points, similar to the kind of dot arrays used in motion tracking for CGI in movies. Eva then imagines how these patterns of dots would look on its face and then moves its facial actuators to bring the new face to life.

Altogether, the team reports that Eva can be manufactured for just $900.

WHAT’S NEXT

Eva is still in its infancy, but Chen says he’s excited to see how other researchers will use this open-source platform to design their own emotional robots — from changing the skin tone to programming real human interactions for Eva. In the future, Chen hopes that expressive robots like Eva will find a home as educators or in healthcare to help care for humans when others can’t.

And as for whether or not Chen finds Eva’s smile creepy, he says he could never be scared by a smile like that.

“This is hard for me because the robot is like our baby,” says Chen. “I absolutely love every part of it.”

{ https://www.inverse.com/ }

08-07-2021 om 00:24 geschreven door peter  

‘Scary’ Boston Dynamics Dance Video Divides Internet as Robo-Dogs Celebrate Hyundai Acquisition

from RT:

American robotics company Boston Dynamics released a new robot dance video after it announced it had been acquired by Hyundai – and, like its previous effort, this one had many people terrified.

Though it announced the completion of the acquisition last week in a press release, Boston Dynamics decided to mark the occasion in style on Tuesday.

The video shows five of its dog-like ‘Spot’ robots dancing to the song ‘IONIQ: I’m On It’ by South Korean boy band BTS, and demonstrates the precision and complexity of its machines, which feature long arm-like appendages with claws.

Source: 

• https://www.sgtreport.com/2021/06/scary-boston-dynamics-dance-video-divides-internet-as-robo-dogs-celebrate-hyundai-acquisition/

{ https://beforeitsnews.com/ }

30-06-2021 om 15:28 geschreven door peter  

Robots may be taking away our jobs, but one consolation (perhaps the ONLY consolation) is that they don’t ever seem to look like they’re enjoying it. Then again, how many of you look like you  enjoy your job … at least pre-pandemic? Well, some robots have decided to rub our human noses into our job losses by curling that thing underneath THEIR useless noses into the creepiest smile ever. If you’ve been searching for incentive to rise up against our robot overlords, that look may be it.

“The idea for EVA took shape a few years ago, when my students and I began to notice that the robots in our lab were staring back at us through plastic, googly eyes.”

Hod Lipson, James and Sally Scapa Professor of Innovation (Mechanical Engineering) and director of the Creative Machines Lab at Columbia Engineering (Columbia University), explains in a press release how an observation by students who hadn’t yet gotten jobs that they would eventually lose to robots turned into a study called “Smile Like You Mean It: Driving Animatronic Robotic Face with Learned Models” which led to the development of EVA, an autonomous robot with a soft face and AI Learning algorithms it used to mimic the facial expressions of humans around it.

EVA

(CREDIT: Creative Machines Lab/Columbia Engineering)

“The greatest challenge in creating EVA was designing a system that was compact enough to fit inside the confines of a human skull while still being functional enough to produce a wide range of facial expressions.”

Undergraduate student Zanwar Faraj led the team in developing artificial cable-and-pulley facial muscles to replace the more than 42 tiny muscles in a human face. That gave the robot the ability to express the six basic emotions of anger, disgust, fear, joy, sadness, and surprise, plus an array of more nuanced feelings. Over the mechanics they stretched a blue skin resembling a member of the popular and much-loved Blue Man Group performance art company. To make the robotic face closer to a human one than the animatronic robots at theme parks, they gave EVA deep learning artificial intelligence to “read” and then mirror the expressions on nearby human faces, and then learn more by watching videos of itself. In that way, EVA obtained a ‘self-image’.

Did it work?

“I was minding my own business one day when EVA suddenly gave me a big, friendly smile. I knew it was purely mechanical, but I found myself reflexively smiling back.”

Hod Lipson was one of the first to come under the control of EVA. He admits that his reflex response to the smiling EVA was one of the goals of the project – he had noticed that grocery stores using restocking robots often decked them out in name badges and clothing to give them a human identity, and decided the next step was to make a robot that could control that identity and its responses itself.

“Our brains seem to respond well to robots that have some kind of recognizable physical presence.”

That’s true … but is it wise? Boyuan Chen, a PhD student who led the software phase of the project, added this:

“Robots are intertwined in our lives in a growing number of ways, so building trust between humans and machines is increasingly important.”

What could possibly go wrong?

What’s the harm in making a robot smile? What’s the first thing a con man does? Or a politician? Or a pusher? A kidnapper? Anyone looking to win your trust before they violate it?

We now have a smiling robot that can make you reflexively smile back. What do you think it’s going to say as it smilingly leads you away and you ask it to tell you where it’s taking you? You’ve seen this movie before.

“I’m sorry Dave. I’m afraid I can’t do that.”

Who’s in the blue man group now?

RELATED VIDEOS, selected and posted by peter2011

{ https://mysteriousuniverse.org/ }

03-06-2021 om 23:56 geschreven door peter  

War games: Army's new night vision goggles look like they are straight out of Halo video games

• The US Army is using advanced night vision goggles on the battlefield

• Footage of the device in action shows human figures outlined in glowing light

• This allows users see enemies in the dead of night, regardless of weather

• The footage was shared to Twitter with some users comparing it to Halo

• In the video game, figures are also outlined in a glowing light 

By STACY LIBERATORE FOR DAILYMAIL.COM

The US Army has high-powered night vision goggles that provide war fighters with the ability to pick out enemies in the dead of night, regardless of weather conditions.

The military group’s Lancer Brigade shared footage of the new Enhanced Night Vision Goggle-Binoculars in action, which shows glowing figures that some liken to those in the popular ‘Halo’ video game.

The system includes a new, high-resolution display and an embedded soldier wireless personal area network, rapid target acquisition and augmented reality algorithms to interface with the Army’s Nett Warrior.

Using the goggles, soldiers can keep their eyes on their target without looking down to read maps or check radios, as all information is shown on the display.

More than 4,800 of the combat-ready devices are now in the hands of the US Army.

Scroll down for video 

The military group’s Lancer Brigade shared footage of the new Enhanced Night Vision Goggle-Binoculars in action, which shows glowing figures that some liken to those in the popular ‘Halo’ video game

The footage shows glowing figures that some liken to those in the popular ‘Halo’ video game (pictured) 

The US Army has high-powered night vision goggles that provide war fighters with the ability to pick out enemies in the dead of night, regardless of weather conditions

The Enhanced Night Vision Goggle-Binoculars (ENVG-B) was developed by L3Harris Technologies, a global aerospace and defense technology innovator, specifically to be used on the battlefield.

Lynn Bollengier, President, Integrated Vision Solutions, L3Harris, said: ‘The ENVG-B is the most advanced night vision goggle ever developed for and fielded by the US Army, enabling a soldier to see and maneuver in zero and low-light situations.

‘We have delivered more than 4,500 combat-ready systems to the US Army, which meet today’s urgent operational needs of our close combat forces.’

In the tweet shared by Lancer Brigade it says: ‘You have never seen night vision like this.’

The clip posted shows the body of soldiers outlined in a glowing light as they move through the forest, fire guns and rest during missions.

However, one Twitter user commented with ‘I have, actually’ to the statement and included an image from the popular video game Halo.

The video game is a military science fiction franchise that is focused around soldiers going to war with aliens.

And the images seen through the ENVG-B looks similar to those with Halo 3’s Visual Intelligence System, Reconnaissance (VISR).

The clip posted shows the body of soldiers outlined in a glowing light as they move through the forest, fire guns and rest during missions

In the tweet shared by Lancer Brigade it says: ‘You have never seen night vision like this.' One Twitter user commented with ‘I have, actually’ to the statement and included an image from the popular video game Halo

It weighs just 2.5 pounds and attaches to the front of a helmet, allowing users to easily switch between monocular and binocular visioning

VISR provides navigational data and highlights various points of interest in the operational area, along with outlining figures in glowing light.

However, ENVG-B is the real deal that provides soldiers with actionable intelligence through the fusion of Image Intensified (I2) white phosphor tubes and thermal imaging.

The advanced goggles also provide targeting and identification in all battlefield conditions as well as light levels including degraded visual environments such as smoke, fog and debris.

It weighs just 2.5 pounds and attaches to the front of a helmet, allowing users to easily switch between monocular and binocular visioning.

{ https://www.dailymail.co.uk/ }

30-05-2021 om 01:14 geschreven door peter  

By: Nidhi Goyal 

Image courtesy Wikimedia Commons

{ https://www.industrytap.com/ }

30-05-2021 om 01:01 geschreven door peter  

NOBEL WINNER: ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE WILL CRUSH HUMANS, “IT’S NOT EVEN CLOSE”

FROM THE DEPT. OF PEOPLE YOU SHOULD REALLY, REALLY LISTEN TO.

Endgame, Set, Match

It’s common knowledge, at this point, that artificial intelligence will soon be capable of outworking humans — if not entirely outmoding them — in plenty of areas. How much we’ll be outworked and outmoded, and on what scale, is still up for debate. But in a new interview published by The Guardian over the weekend, Nobel Prize winner Daniel Kahneman had a fairly hot take on the matter: In the battle between AI and humans, he said, it’s going to be an absolute blowout — and humans are going to get creamed.

“Clearly AI is going to win [against human intelligence]. It’s not even close,” Kahneman told the paper. “How people are going to adjust to this is a fascinating problem.”

Prospect Theory

Why listen to Daniel Kahneman? His 2011 book, “Thinking, Fast and Slow” — over two million copies sold — is one of the most influential tomes in the field of behavioral economics, exploring how and why humans think the way they think (the “fast” thinking of the title being intuitive; the “slow” thinking being rational), and what leaves us prepared (or unprepared) to make decisions about our future. But moreover, he won his 2002 Nobel Prize for pioneering “prospect theory,” which explains how people rationalize the difference between gains and losses, and how their thresholds for risk aversion and risk appetite work.

And why, according to Kahneman, are we so unprepared for the forthcoming takeover of artificial intelligence? Speaking to the way the pandemic overtook an unprepared world, Kahneman cited the exponential growth of the virus. Human minds, he explained, are essentially unequipped to handle the basic math underlying how something like a Covid outbreak can spiral out of control on a global scale.

“Exponential phenomena are almost impossible for us to grasp,” he told The Guardian. “We are very experienced in a more or less linear world. And if things are accelerating, they’re usually accelerating within reason. Exponential change [as with the spread of virus] is really something else. We’re not equipped for it. It takes a long time to educate intuition.”

Gird Your Maladaptive Loins

Winding up into the discussion about AI, Kahneman noted the issue with human minds: “There is going to be massive disruption. Technology is developing very rapidly, possibly exponentially. But people are linear. When linear people are faced with exponential change, they’re not going to be able to adapt to that very easily.” Kahneman cites medicine as one place humans are going to be replaced, “certainly in terms of diagnosis.” And elsewhere, he issues a stark message to the boardrooms of the world: “There are rather frightening scenarios when you’re talking about leadership. Once it’s demonstrably true that you can have an AI that has far better business judgment, say, what will that do to human leadership?”

If nothing else, Kahenman’s quotables feel canny — like maybe if the people in the C-suite are scared for their jobs, someone who can do something about any of this might actually listen.

READ MORE: 

• Daniel Kahneman: ‘Clearly AI is going to win. How people are going to adjust is a fascinating problem’ [The Guardian]

{ https://futurism.com/the-byte }

23-05-2021 om 22:38 geschreven door peter  

From the “What could possibly go wrong?” and the “They didn’t listen the first time!” files comes the double-whammy news that those controversial genetically-altered mosquitoes, designed to control their populations by killing off all of the biting females while leaving the non-biting males, have been released in Florida and are mating, while scientists not waiting to see what happens are already genetically engineering armyworms to kill off all of the females and stop them from destroying billions of dollars’ worth of crops worldwide. What happens when a genetically-engineered mosquito bites a genetically-engineered armyworm and a human accidentally eats it?

The mosquitoes contain a proprietary gene belonging to Oxitec, which calls it “the world’s leading insect-based biological control system to safely and sustainably control insects that transmit disease and destroy crops.” Residents of the Florida Keys have been demanding more information, independent testing and safety studies for a decade, but claim they’ve received little response from Oxitec nor support from local government or the agricultural industry. Previous tests using Aedes aegypti mosquitoes were conducted in in Brazil, the Cayman Islands, Panama and Malaysia, and the company reported that local mosquito populations fell by at least 90% in those locations. However, Live Science reports that in Brazil genes from the insects cropped up in local mosquito populations because the lethal gene failed to kill off all of the females before they could mate.

Besides this, another thing that could go wrong in Florida is that tetracycline turns off the self-destruct mechanism in female larvae. However, that’s the same antibiotic used in sewage treatment plants. Oxitec claims the testing locations are far enough away from plants and other tetracycline-using areas to avoid this possibility. Should the tests be halted while they look for other things that went wrong in Florida?

Too late.

“The collaboration between Bayer and Oxitec in the development of a ‘friendly’ fall armyworm explores a promising new approach to support integrated pest management, helping farmers manage destructive pests more sustainably while reducing the need for other inputs.”

According to Zenger.news, by “friendly” Bob Reiter, head of crop science research and development at Bayer, means these genetically modified male fall armyworms (Spodoptera frugiperda), also from Oxitec, will not harm the environment, other animals or humans while the kill off all of the female armyworms before the eat corn/maize, rice, sorghum, sugarcane, wheat, and 75 other crop species in Asia, Africa, and the Americas. Fall armyworms are highly reproductive and spread quickly – they spread to 12 countries in Africa in 2016 and 2017, to India’s southern state of Karnataka in 2018 and to China in 2019. India, with its huge population needing huge amounts of food, is considering the genetically modified male fall armyworms – does anyone think its questionable leadership will handle this any better than the coronavirus?

Adult fall armyworm

Pests are definitely a problem – but pests are in the eye of the beholder. Many traditional crops are resistant to these insects, but they don’t adapt to industrialized mass farming. Similarly, development in areas where the mosquitoes formerly lived undisturbed and not spreading disease to humans results in … disease spreading to humans. Did anyone ask “What could possibly go wrong?” when these things spread?

They did. They didn’t listen the first time. Isn’t it time to ask louder now … and not give up?

{ https://mysteriousuniverse.org/ }

17-05-2021 om 23:57 geschreven door peter  

Does Putin really need another army? Russia's defence minister wants to CLONE 3,000-year-old ancient warriors from remains found in Siberia (and their horses to boot)

• Sergei Shoigu has unveiled desire to clone ancient royal warriors in Siberia   

• The ancient Tunnug burial site is located in the Valley of the Kings in Tuva 

• 'We would like very much to find the organic matter,' the defence minister said 

By WILL STEWART IN MOSCOW FOR MAILONLINE

Russia's defence minister has taken time out from massing troops on Ukraine's borders to unveil a 'Dolly the Sheep' cloning dream involving ancient royal warriors and their prize horses using DNA preserved in permafrost.

Sergei Shoigu - one of Vladimir Putin's closest allies - spoke about the potential of the extraordinary 3,000-year-old Scythian burials in Tuva, his mountainous native republic in Siberia.

The ancient Tunnug burial site of nomadic warriors - often laid to rest with their horses - is in an area known as the Valley of the Kings in Tuva.

Excavation works at the Tunnug royal burial in the Valley of the Kings, Republic of Tuva

Sergei Shoigu, pictured above, one of Vladimir Putin's closest allies - spoke about the potential of the extraordinary 3,000-year-old Scythian burials in Tuva

Excavation works at the Tunnug royal burial in the Valley of the Kings, Republic of Tuva

Shamans performed a rite to bless the start of excavation at the ancient Tunnug burial mound

The defence chief told a session of the Russian Geographical Society, also attended remotely by Putin, on Wednesday: 'Of course, we would like very much to find the organic matter.'

He was referring to well-preserved remains of ancient people and animals, explained TASS.

'I believe you understand what would follow that,' said Shoigu in a broadcast by Zvezda TV.

'It would be possible to make something of it, if not Dolly the Sheep.'

He added, without explaining more of planned genomic research that 'in general, it will be very interesting'.

The burials were in permafrost and according to scientists, organic matter should be preserved there.

'We have conducted several expeditions there already, it is a big international expedition.

'A lot of things have been confirmed, but a lot remains to be done.'

Shoigu has been in the limelight in recent days spearheading Russia's build up of almost 100,000 troops close to Ukraine, triggering fears of a new war - but at this session he spoke about more ancient warriors.

The burial is among the earlier Scythian remains.

Greek historian Herodotus in the fifth century BC claimed the Scythians made cloaks from their victims' scalps after victory.

The savage warriors are believed to have used their enemies' skulls as drinking cups.

Aerial view of the The Valley of the Kings in the Republic of Tuva. The burials were in permafrost and according to scientists, organic matter should be preserved there

Entrance to The Valley of the Kings in the Republic of Tuva

Aerial view of the The Valley of the Kings in the Republic of Tuva. The defence chief told a session of the Russian Geographical Society, also attended remotely by Putin, on Wednesday: 'Of course, we would like very much to find the organic matter' 

Legend says they drank the blood of their vanquished foes.

The valley contains so-called 'tsar' mounds from the Scythian era.

It is not the first time Shoigu has spoken about finding 'organic' matter which can be investigated by scientists for DNA.

While exciting remains have been found, there are still hopes to dig deeper into the mounds and find remains similar to a tattooed princess discovered in a mound in Siberia's Altai Mountains.

Wikimedia commonsEquipment from Scythian horse riders of northern Black Sea region and Kuban region, dated circa 7-5th century, B.C.

{ https://www.dailymail.co.uk/ }

14-05-2021 om 20:42 geschreven door peter  

Russia's Plan to Clone an Army of 3,000 Year Old Scythian Warriors via Leak Project

Russia’s Plan to Clone an Army of 3,000 Year Old Scythian Warriors via Leak Project

According to the Iran Chamber Society and others sources, the Scythians are of the Ukraine region. From there they migrated into Iran area and brought the Aryan language-(which infers they are Aryan origin). They are known for traits of incredible warrior skills. With this combo, Ukraine-Aryan-natural warrior skills, it’s no wonder Russia’s interest..they always are after the best of the best. y4

{ https://beforeitsnews.com/ }

14-05-2021 om 20:23 geschreven door peter